McCain: Cruz 'Pretty Strong' on Foreign Policy, Attacks Rand

16 Sep 2014

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) criticized Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) for his foreign policy positions while praising the national security platform of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) on Tuesday’s “Your World with Neil Cavuto” on the Fox News Channel.

“I think that Ted Cruz has been pretty good on some of this, aspect[s] of this crisis, I think he’s been pretty strong on ISIS.” McCain stated. He also responded “Oh yeah, of course” when asked if he thought Cruz was better on national defense than Paul.

McCain said Paul had “a fundamental lack of understanding of the situation and the threats we face. Senator Paul has obviously being doing some somersaults as [these] beheadings took place and the American people’s opinion has shifted rather dramatically. He has even said I met with ISIS, which is a patently false [claim], in fact ISIS has called me the number one enemy when I went to Syria and met with these brave young men, some of whom are dead now. So, it’s I think it’s kind of a desperation kind of trying to find some footing here as he slides down a very steep slope of credibility.”

He added that Paul would not be a good Commander-in-Chief on matters of national security. And “he has dramatically shifted his positions on national security. He said we shouldn’t intervene, no matter what, anywhere, and now obviously he wants to take out ISIL. Well, if you want to take out ISIS then you’re have to take certain measures and that means serious American involvement…I don’t think he understands the nature of the threat, and I don’t think he understands how serious it is.”